LEAVING NEW YORK

There is a strange thing about leaving a place you have called home for a long time. You don’t necessarily know which goodbye is the last one. That is what I have been thinking about this week as I make my way around New York, revisiting some of the places that have been part of my life for years. Some are places I may never see again. Others I know I will probably return to someday, because leaving New York doesn’t mean I will never come back. The road has a way of bringing you back around.

But for now, I am looking at familiar places with a slightly different eye. I started in Brooklyn, heading back toward the neighborhood where our family lived when I was a child. It was very early in the morning and the sky was still dark, so I crossed the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge onto Staten Island first.

Tucked beneath the Verrazzano’s massive span sits an old, abandoned military installation that nature is slowly reclaiming. Fort Wadsworth is a historic site managed by the National Park Service as part of Gateway National Recreation Area.

Crumbling concrete and stone artillery battery emplacements remain scattered across the landscape like ruins lost in a city too busy to notice. In the distance, the lights of Manhattan glistened across the harbor. It was windy and cool, but not cold, and the sky was still dark. I had wanted to watch the sunrise, but it never happened. Instead, a thick layer of low clouds covered the horizon, leaving only a narrow strip of reddish-orange light peeking out from underneath.

The thin band of color seemed to float beneath the clouds, reflecting faintly across the harbor while the city slowly emerged from the darkness. NYC wasn’t yet fully awake. Lights still glimmered along the shoreline, the water was dark, and the enormous silhouette of the bridge stretched overhead. I stood there for a while and watched the light change. There was no particular reason to hurry.

That may be one of the things I am beginning to appreciate most about these final weeks. When you live somewhere for a long time, familiarity can make you stop seeing it. Places become part of the background, so ordinary that you no longer notice the details. Leaving has a way of making the familiar visible again.

Fort Wadsworth is a perfect example. Even many locals have never heard of it, despite sitting within sight of the Statue of Liberty. The fort itself has a fascinating history. Its defenses included “disappearing guns” — massive artillery pieces designed to rise above the fortifications, fire, and then drop back out of sight. In effect, the guns could appear when needed and disappear again beneath the protection of the fort. Think of it as a military version of Whac-a-Mole.

Today, the contrast is almost surreal. The weapons are gone, the military activity has long since ended, and the landscape is swallowing the structures. The empty fort sits silent beneath the bridge while traffic streams overhead, carrying thousands of people into and out of the city.

And that bridge has always meant something to me. The Brooklyn Bridge gets all the glory, but I have always thought the Verrazzano was the more elegant of the two. Its great towers rise above the Narrows with a sense of scale that somehow manages to feel both monumental and graceful. More importantly, it has been a pivotal waypoint in my own travels for years.

The Verrazzano was the last bridge to home. No matter where I was coming from, or how long I had been traveling, crossing that bridge meant I was back on familiar ground and could drive the rest of the way by heart. Today, standing there looking toward Manhattan, Brooklyn, and the open Atlantic just beyond, it felt like the ultimate threshold — a fitting place to begin saying goodbye.

From Fort Wadsworth I continued into Brooklyn, toward the house on West 7th Street where my grandparents had lived, to revisit a piece of family history. That house was part of my family’s story before I ever existed. I knew everything had changed over the years, and I wondered if I would be able to recognize it.

As I turned onto West 7th Street from Avenue U, I rolled slowly down the block, my eyes searching for a familiar facade, until I saw the distinctive bow curve of the front of the building. I smiled as I continued my slow-motion drive by. I remembered it, even though it looked nothing like it used to. The gardens had been cemented over, and a gaudy chrome fence and railings that seemed oversized for the space marked the entryway. There were bars on the windows. But I recognized the old front stoop, and I was glad.

Seeing the old neighborhood was less emotional than I had expected. The tangible links to my family are gone now, existing only in my mind. With that gentle reminder, I could leave Brooklyn behind — honoring those memories, and finally feeling ready for the road ahead.